Back in September, an interesting documentary was shown at the X03 event in France. It was a behind-the-scenes look at the making of Halo 2, created by Film Oasis, the company behind 'Inside the Xbox', a documentary shown on the Discovery Channel last summer. Unfortunately, the only version available has been a shakey-cam piece filmed at the show by a French journalist - better than nothing, but still unsatisfying. If you had access to a Best Buy in the United States, and were willing to spend $19.99 for a new controller, you could get a bundled DVD that contained the hi-res version of this film... but it wasn't available on the net. Until now. Thanks to Jim McQuillan at Film Oasis and the legal eagles at Bungie, we're able to bring you this video, in all its hi-res beauty. There are two versions; for the big bandwidth folks, there's a 100 mb, 640x480 copy, and for folks on smaller pipes, you can grab a 38 mb, 320x240 version. We've put up a pair of copies of each (on files.bungie.org and mythica.org) - but we're always happy to spread the bandwidth pain; if you've got the space, grab a copy, and send us the link, we'll add it to our Mirror page. This one's worth seeing. Update: Two new mirrors for each size - Coerce.net and Subnova have both tossed their hats into the Bandwidth ring. Thanks, guys! Update 2: Brian Towne has put up BitTorrent seeds for both large and small versions - grab these if you have the client; not only will they be faster, but they'll be less strain on our mirrors. Thanks! (Louis Wu 17:27:56 UTC)

Big thanks for the link Mate.:beer:
bentlama: You hear of a game in the works named "Advent rising? Sounds and looks quite good,alot in the mold of halo I believe,we shall see just how much in the mold soon enough however.Cheers.:beer:

Crazzy Legs

12 December 2003, 08:03 PM

thank you kind sir.

onlooker

12 December 2003, 08:16 PM

I saw this a while back, but it was nice to watch it again. I only wish it was coming out sooner. It looks way too fun. :D :thumbsup:

PixelShader

12 December 2003, 09:33 PM

Mirror is up on CGNetworks for CGTalk members. Share the bandwidth pain, and the love.... ;)

Geoff

MosaFacku

12 December 2003, 01:07 AM

bent, it looks like you've got some sort of furry animal wrapped around your neck :p

JooS-10

12 December 2003, 04:57 AM

THANKS!

bentllama

12 December 2003, 05:46 AM

Originally posted by MosaFacku
bent, it looks like you've got some sort of furry animal wrapped around your neck :p

"crunch-time" beardy!!!

sort of like an NHL playoff beard only way cooler...

1000101

12 December 2003, 06:36 AM

Please don't let gearbox do the PC port for the next halo.

MaDSheeP

12 December 2003, 06:41 AM

i wonder if microsoft coffe is any good...

;) (http://madsheep.scifi-meshes.com/msnoft.jpg)

Lee3dee

12 December 2003, 02:58 PM

dammit, this video is teasing me! just release the opening game on a demo cd with a magazine, so we can all get our fix!.

More and more, bungie raises the bar, and sells more xbox'. lol

WhiteRabbitObj

12 December 2003, 03:28 PM

Score. I didn't get my XBox till this past summer so I never got Halo. Lookin forward to getting number 2 though. Only ever played the first one multiplayer once, and that was outrageously fun, so it ought to be cooool.

[edit] Apparently there is no color inside the Bungie offices! :D

mattregnier

12 December 2003, 03:42 PM

Originally posted by WhiteRabbit.obj
Score. I didn't get my XBox till this past summer so I never got Halo. Lookin forward to getting number 2 though. Only ever played the first one multiplayer once, and that was outrageously fun, so it ought to be cooool.

You purchased an Xbox and you don't own Halo? Man that is like Sacriliage, for shame! ;)

*Screams for Bent to chime in, Open up the can o' whoopass on him....haha

WhiteRabbitObj

12 December 2003, 07:23 PM

Originally posted by mattregnier
You purchased an Xbox and you don't own Halo? Man that is like Sacriliage, for shame! ;)

*Screams for Bent to chime in, Open up the can o' whoopass on him....haha

Heh, I'm one of those people Microsoft hates. I've not really made them any money because I only own one controller and three games. The game I bought the system for: KOTOR, Pirate of the Carribean (damned bugs ruin this otherwise good game), and Shenmue 2, which I never actually got into.

barto9

12 December 2003, 09:19 PM

does anyone know the latest on the release on halo 2? ive had a copy on reserve ever since the word was that it was supposed to come out winter 2003 :hmm:

bentllama

12 December 2003, 09:46 PM

Originally posted by barto9
does anyone know the latest on the release on halo 2? ive had a copy on reserve ever since the word was that it was supposed to come out winter 2003 :hmm:

"when it's done"

daevid

12 December 2003, 09:55 PM

sorry for being negative, but is there anything new in this clip that isn't in the original game? (which in my opinion is the most overrated game ever... still I'm a sucker for cooperative gameplay though, so I hope this game won't be as dissappointing)

/David

Neil

12 December 2003, 02:54 AM

I like the new sounds of the guns. It could just be the compression, but they sound new.

I wish more companies would do stuff like this, it's always cool to see the people behind the scenes. Maya had a bunch of these on their website (basically promoting Maya, duh) but you still got to see the artists, and see how they did those sweet rigs for characters like Final Fantasy :drool:

BTW: I'm doing my part to help by leaving BitTorrent running ;)

bentllama

12 December 2003, 04:47 AM

Originally posted by daevid
sorry for being negative, but is there anything new in this clip that isn't in the original game? (which in my opinion is the most overrated game ever... still I'm a sucker for cooperative gameplay though, so I hope this game won't be as dissappointing)

/David

may I ask what you did not like about Halo 1? I am always interested in hearing other peoples opinions...

WhiteRabbitObj

12 December 2003, 05:36 AM

bentllama, what I always heard was that the level design was pretty repetitive, and the stages generally boiled down to "find a key to open a door." This is what deterred me from buying the original now that I have an XBox. I heard that repetitiveness problem so often that I figured, with Halo2 coming soon enough, I'd wait until then and you folks would probably have read the reviews and taken that into account and tried to fix some of those issues.

I personally have always found it extremely difficult to play FPS on consoles, though I started to get the hang of multiplayer Halo after a little while, but I never got the chance to play a lot. Will Halo 2 have a nice auto-aim, at least for the single player game? That'd be sweet, and something to suggest if it's not in there and not too difficult to implement (what with deadlines and lots to do I imagine people would knife anyone suggesting new features at this point :D )

mattregnier

12 December 2003, 02:14 PM

Originally posted by WhiteRabbit.obj
bentllama, what I always heard was that the level design was pretty repetitive, and the stages generally boiled down to "find a key to open a door."

whiterabbit-
I think the single player exp was definitely a good one. Most of the levels true were run through, fight monsters, activate switch, fight monsters, lather, rinse, repeat. Period. BUT....before I get castrated by Bent...

The Multiplayer aspect of Halo was where it's at. You have no idea how fun that game can be until you hookup 2-4 Xboxs together and are fragging at a lan party with like 8-16 of your closest friends. That is one of my most memorable experiences of college was working late in the computer labs and hooking up two xboxs to an HD tv and another huge tv and lanning them together. Talk about a great way to pass your time while rendering :)

barto9

12 December 2003, 01:40 AM

i heard that on halo 2 you can link x box's for missions so you can have like more than 2 people for co op mode

bentllama

12 December 2003, 03:33 AM

Originally posted by WhiteRabbit.obj
bentllama, what I always heard was that the level design was pretty repetitive, and the stages generally boiled down to "find a key to open a door." This is what deterred me from buying the original now that I have an XBox. I heard that repetitiveness problem so often that I figured, with Halo2 coming soon enough, I'd wait until then and you folks would probably have read the reviews and taken that into account and tried to fix some of those issues.

I personally have always found it extremely difficult to play FPS on consoles, though I started to get the hang of multiplayer Halo after a little while, but I never got the chance to play a lot. Will Halo 2 have a nice auto-aim, at least for the single player game? That'd be sweet, and something to suggest if it's not in there and not too difficult to implement (what with deadlines and lots to do I imagine people would knife anyone suggesting new features at this point :D )

If you have only HEARD these opinions, then why not rent the game and formulate your own?

Thanks for sharing your thoughts whiterabbit, I appreciate it. :beer:

daevid

12 December 2003, 12:32 PM

Bentlama, I'm happy to share my thoughts, even though it was quite a while since a played the game and I think you've heard most of it before:

Level design:
I agree with the white rabbit that the repetative level design was the most annoying thing in Halo 1. I mean, you plow through four or more similar bunkers, with exacly the same interiors. Most often it seemed like even the enemy troops were standing in the very same positions in the different bunkers...

Since a lot of the places in the game looked alike it was quite hard to orient oneself in the world. I normally have a good sense of direction, but in this game I often found myself running in the wrong direction. Easily spotted, unique waypoints would have helped a lot.

Pacing:
The repetition in the level design made the story development and gaming experience feel very slow. I often wondered if the designer late in to the production phase had realized that the total game time wasn't sufficient and simply slapped in some extra identical bunkers, without creating additional story elements. I had personally, much rather played a shorter campaign, which could have managed to grab my attention throughout the whole campaign.

As it was now there was this really good surprise when you activate the "flood" which is one of my most memorable gaming experiences ever, but the repetition before this sequence almost had me stop playing the game.

An example of a shooter that in my opinion has very good level design is Soldier of Fortune 2 with very nice varied environments and nice semi-scripted action sequences (BUT it has very sloppy cut scenes, and some irritating bugs like enemies seeing and shooting you through brick walls...)

Cheers,
/David

Chewey

12 December 2003, 02:39 PM

Cool video! Could have been a bit better with less face time given to the speakers and more time devoted to shots of the game itself.

They should have given a tad more face time to the head lama though...

Looking forward to the release!

Neil

12 December 2003, 06:58 PM

Originally posted by Chewey
Cool video! Could have been a bit better with less face time given to the speakers and more time devoted to shots of the game itself.

They should have given a tad more face time to the head lama though...

Looking forward to the release!

Well if you just wanted shots of the game, why not just get the trailer instead?
http://halo.bungie.org/misc/halo2trailermirrors.html

Chewey

12 December 2003, 07:42 PM

Originally posted by Neil
Well if you just wanted shots of the game, why not just get the trailer instead?
http://halo.bungie.org/misc/halo2trailermirrors.html

that'll work. Watching talking heads wax poetic aint all that interesting when they get long winded.

Neil

12 December 2003, 08:31 PM

Originally posted by Chewey
that'll work. Watching talking heads wax poetic aint all that interesting when they get long winded.

Different strokes then. Every game that is released has long winded trailers, very few ever give you insight into them or explanations of why you see what you see.

Chewey

12 December 2003, 01:18 AM

Originally posted by Neil
Different strokes then. Every game that is released has long winded trailers, very few ever give you insight into them or explanations of why you see what you see.

uh huh, that's really neat...

bentllama

12 December 2003, 09:05 AM

daevid:

thanks for your thoughts. your comments are inline with many other people who experienced play in halo 1...and let me say this, BUNGIE has a rabid habit of listening to its fans...we want to do the best game we possibly can in the relatively decent time frame we choose...we are gamers and artists and tech junkies rolled into one studio synergy and we have a passion for doing our best...we want to enjoy the games we create just as much as the rest of the public...

I hope your experience with Halo 1 does not leave you at a predistposition to not experience Halo 2, what I personally think we be a great game...

again, thanks for you comments. it is discussion like this that makes cgtalk a great place to frequent!

:beer:

Schwinnz

12 December 2003, 06:19 PM

I really enjoyed Halo PC, the single player is good, the multiplayer is fabulous ! Halo 2 will probably kick asses !

Now what I'm waiting for are the editing tools. Can you say something about it ?

1000101

12 December 2003, 08:52 PM

I'll probably mess around with halo 2 at a friends house and end up making a judgement call. Of course if its like Halo 1 and ends up X-box only I'm not going to bother. hate first person shooters on consoles.

I would like to see a co-op multi-player mode. Thats something fresh and interesting I haven't seen done lately. Though Halo-1 multi-player was mildly entertaining; it didn't really bring anything onto the table that tribes or one of many mods couldn't allready offer me; except less players and no bot support to fill in gas when friends aren't around.

Hopefully halo-2 can reach the vision that was laid out many moons ago when Halo was showcased on an Apple with all those really nift and cool features.

bentllama

12 December 2003, 07:57 AM

Originally posted by Schwinnz
Now what I'm waiting for are the editing tools. Can you say something about it ?

soon.

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